(Lansing, Mich.) — The Catholic Press Association of the United States and Canada announced this week that Michigan Catholic Conference is among its first-place Gabriel Award winners for the short television feature “Hands of Service and Healing.” The one-minute television advertisement features the work of Catholic Charities personnel to assist vulnerable persons, especially through the provision of fresh water and necessary services in the city of Flint.

“Every day faith-filled Catholic Charities staff and volunteers provide material, emotional, and spiritual support for vulnerable persons in communities across the state,” said David Maluchnik, Michigan Catholic Conference Vice President for Communications. “This award is a testament to faith, service and charity, and the critical role Catholic agencies play to uplift the human dignity of every person in our society.”

“Hands of Service and Healing” was one of several thirty and sixty-second television commercials Michigan Catholic Conference ran on broadcast and cable networks across the state in 2017. A substantial digital advertising campaign complemented the TV effort. This Freedom to Serve advertising sought to highlight the important role individual persons, guided by their faith, play in educating children, healing the sick, and providing for the needs of vulnerable persons at Catholic institutions across the state.

The Gabriel Awards, founded in 1965, honors works of excellence in film, network, cable television and radio as well as social media. The Award recognizes outstanding artistic achievement in media that entertains and enriches with a true vision of humanity and a true vision of life. Entrants go through a highly selective process of preliminary screening and blue-ribbon judging for values, content, creativity, artistic quality, technical quality and impact. The award is a silver angel, Gabriel, raising a globe skyward, encircled by electrons to symbolize the communication of God’s word to humanity.

The Freedom to Serve television and digital commercials are derived from short documentaries filmed and produced in Michigan by Mr. Jim Hanon and his firm Minus Red. This is the second Gabriel Award Michigan Catholic Conference has won, with the first coming in 1998 for a short film – also produced by Jim Hanon – that sought to educate Catholics in Michigan about the Catholic Church’s teaching on end-of-life matters. Last month, Michigan Catholic Conference announced that the Central Michigan Chapter of the Public Relations Society of America honored the organization with four awards, three of which were its first place Pinnacle Award, the organization’s highest honor for excellence in public relations.

The Catholic Press Association of the United States and Canada has been serving the Catholic press for more than one hundred years and is widely recognized as the most active and vibrant group of Catholic communicators in the world. With nearly 250 publication members and 600 individual members in the association, member print publications reach 10 million households plus countless others through websites and social media outlets.

Michigan Catholic Conference is the official public policy voice of the Catholic Church in this state.